Cops block wrong-way drivers

Tuesday

Apr 9, 2013 at 12:01 AMApr 9, 2013 at 1:54 PM

Columbus police are guarding some Downtown freeway exit ramps overnight in an effort to stop drivers from getting onto interstates the wrong way. Wrong-way drivers, who often are impaired, have been an issue in recent months, causing five serious crashes or near-collisions.

Allison Manning, The Columbus Dispatch

Columbus police are guarding some Downtown freeway exit ramps overnight in an effort to stop drivers from getting onto interstates the wrong way.

Wrong-way drivers, who often are impaired, have been an issue in recent months, causing five serious crashes or near-collisions. One was a fatality: In February, a driver on I-670 killed himself and injured a pregnant woman who was driving the car he hit. That woman went into labor early and the baby boy she delivered died.

For the past few weeks, Columbus officers have been assigned overnight “guard duty” at the exit ramps. Lt. Brent Mull, who supervises the city’s traffic bureau, didn’t know how many wrong-way drivers had been stopped or issued citations.

“Just having law-enforcement present, it goes into that uncounted category of, ‘What did we just prevent?’??” Mull said.

Last year, there were at least 109 calls made to Columbus police reporting a wrong-way driver on a city freeway. At least two fatal crashes last year — one on I-71 near Greenlawn Avenue and another on Rt. 104 — were caused by wrong-way drivers.

Many calls were concentrated in the Downtown’s Innerbelt — the loop created by I-70, I-670, I-71 and Rt. 315 — though officials weren’t sure why there seem to be more wrong-way drivers there.

On Feb. 21, the same night as the fatal wrong-way crash on I-670, a driver got on I-71 at 17th Avenue, driving south in the northbound lanes. He drove into a work area and nearly hit a construction worker, Columbus police said.

A week after that, another driver got turned around Downtown, and police pursued him on the wrong side of I-70 all the way to I-270 on the East Side before he stopped.

And on Saturday morning this past weekend, a motorist went the wrong way on I-71 south near Hudson Street, where he hit a cab. The next night, a Downtown wrong-way driver on E. Long Street near N. 3rd Street hit a Columbus police cruiser.

Of all the incidents, only the Long Street driver was not under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

Sgt. Michael Smith, of the Columbus police traffic bureau, said the crashes aren’t tied to any specific event or venue. Most, however, do occur late at night.

In addition to the overnight guard duty already under way, Columbus police are getting help through the next 10 days from State Highway Patrol troopers.

Two to three extra Columbus police cruisers and a mobile breath-testing vehicle will be deployed each night until April 20, joining seven other cruisers from the patrol that will be added overnight during those 10 days.

In 2005, a similar rash of wrong-way crashes prompted officials to erect about 1,000 warning signs on exit ramps. In that year, there had been seven wrong-way crashes from December through April.

Mull said he’d like to see sensors similar to those installed in Houston and San Antonio that can detect when a vehicle is going the wrong way.

“It’s definitely going to cost more,” Mull said. “But what does a life cost?”